


easy baby, maybe i'm a liar

by orphan_account



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Car Accidents, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Minor Injuries, Teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-01-15
Packaged: 2018-05-14 01:22:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5724220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lonely, late night escapades on moonlit country roads weren't out of the ordinary for Dan, but he always went alone. When Phil offered the passenger seat, however, Dan and his pent up feelings came along for the ride without a second thought.</p>
            </blockquote>





	easy baby, maybe i'm a liar

**Author's Note:**

> title from "i'm a mess" by my love ed sheeran !!

Dan preferred night to day, he decided. Daytime demanded too much: deadlines and due-dates, obligatory smiles at people he didn’t like, the expectation of everyone to be doing everything at once. Night, to Dan, proved more subtle with tones of quiet, chaste, null, and lonely - sometimes. Perhaps another appealing factor was the endless diversity. Other nights could be the kind of quiet that demands to be heard, soft whispers and skin-on-skin, white-hot, and suddenly back to the quiescent darkness. But most times, night was just Dan staring at the ceiling at three in the morning purely for the fact that no one could stop him from doing so.

Tonight was a new type of night - neither chaste nor licentious, falling on a spectrum between silent and hushed. Tonight took the word “ambivalent” and gave it new depth.

With an affinity for driving alone at night, the radio on but only clicked up a few notches - background noise to empty thoughts - Dan hadn’t really considered being in the passenger seat at one in the morning until Phil offered the spot.

Dan had always paid close attention to the details that made up Phil. His soft features all melted into each other, swooping and gentle. His jaw led to his ears led to his luminous black hair. Dan knew that the way Phil looked encased his idea of night quite perfectly, until he got to Phil’s eyes. Phil’s eyes contradicted his whole material essence; radiant blues and greens pierced through the dark just as the first glimpse of sunshine in the early morning.

And of course, there was more to Phil than just his physical features. From his unadulterated kindness to his brilliantly creative ideas, he possessed a touch of everything good in the world. Dan couldn’t contain his fondness.

“You can stop staring at any time.” Phil broke Dan from his highly pretentious speculations. Honestly, Dan couldn’t count the number of times he’d heard Phil say that phrase.

“You’re just so pretty,” Dan responded, in the exact tone of voice he had perfected as to propose that he was teasing, but to leave room for thinking otherwise.

“Shut up.” Phil obviously opted for the teasing.

Detaching his gaze from Phil, Dan peered out the window and scanned his eyes over the surrounding scenery. Plenty of long grass filled the fields on either side of the car, rustling as the two drove past. The moon’s reflective rays caused everything to appear more delicate; shadows cast from blades of grass scattered alongside old, deteriorated wooden fences.

“What are you thinking about?” Dan inquired after a few minutes of quieted radio.

“Honestly?” Phil chuckled, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, “I was thinking of what it’d be like to wrestle a crocodile.”

Dan knew Phil to be reticent, withholding anything of significance. Chances were, Phil was not imagining crocodile wrestling. Plus, Dan could recognize the drumming on the wheel as a nervous tick.

“Phil,” Dan simply stated, his line of sight fixated on Phil’s side profile.

“What?” Phil replied, waiting a few moments until he realized Dan wasn’t going to say anything. He turned his head to find Dan staring at him, non-verbally telling Phil that he saw right through the ploy. Dan knew that it wasn’t necessarily like Phil to just randomly go for a drive at a spontaneous time of night; something had to be bothering him.

“Right, then,” Phil murmured, turning his head towards Dan before starting, “I really don’t know what I want to do with my life, you know? I don’t have any clue what I’d enjoy doing or how I could-”

“ _Holy fuck_ , is that a-” Dan was going to say _horse_ , but he realized that it indeed was a horse standing in the middle of the road before he finished the question.

“Oh, _shhhit_ ,” Phil turned the steering wheel to the right as far as he could, causing the vehicle to whip around in circles.

All that could run through Dan’s mind in that moment was that _this was it_ , he was going to die, he was going to _die_ , and there was only one thing he had to say, really.

“Phil, I love you!” Dan managed to scream over the violent whirring and whipping of the machine.

The vehicle skid to a stop approximately thirty seconds later, utter silence ringing in Dan’s ears. He lifted his shaken head from the restraint that it had been so harshly pressed against, and with his blurred vision, Dan squinted at the sight around him. Now, he was in the middle of a field he had just been looking at minutes prior, a small amount of smoke rising from the front of the vehicle. He pointed his head towards Phil with some difficulty to see Phil slumped unnaturally sideways in his chair. Dan gasped, unbuckling himself and crawling over the console of the car to get closer to Phil. A gash ran over his left eyebrow; his head must’ve collided with the steering wheel. Dan brushed his finger over Phil’s brow, blood smearing onto Dan’s hand.

Refraining from just cussing a billion times in a row, Dan popped open the door on his side of the car and clambered out. He wasn’t really hurt besides the fact he couldn’t turn his head without multiple twinges of pain, but even if he were more hurt than he was, Phil would still be his number one priority.

Before the car could blow up or something extreme like that, Dan wanted to get Phil out. He walked around the back of the vehicle and opened Phil’s door, unbuckling him and carefully trying to get him out of his seat. He grasped Phil’s arm and placed it around his own shoulder, tugging him out of the car and placing his feet on the ground. Realizing this wasn’t going to get them anywhere, Dan scooped Phil’s legs up and began to carry him bridal-style. Phil’s eyebrow wasn’t letting up on the bleeding, so after walking a bit away from the car (which probably wasn’t going to explode, but how was Dan to know?) he laid Phil onto the ground. Despite the possibility of an explosion, Dan hurried back to the car to find a spare shirt in the back seat, hoping it wasn’t a favorite of Phil’s as soon it was to be covered in blood.

After holding the shirt to Phil’s face for a few minutes, it occurred to Dan that he should probably call someone. While still applying pressure with the cloth, Dan pulled out his phone just to cuss at it because of the lack of service.

Suddenly the soft shadows the moon casted on the grass became vaguely threatening rather than poetic, and Dan wanted nothing more than for Phil to just wake up. His mind began racing through worst possible scenarios, like that Phil was comatose or losing too much blood or that no one would find them and Dan would be forced to carry Phil back miles to any civilization. He knew that these outcomes were highly improbable, but he still tortured himself with them. As time passed, the ideas became even more absurd and Dan wanted to travel back in time and tell Phil to make a different turn or maybe just decline Phil’s offer in the first place - he wouldn’t decline, though, really. Any chance to spend time with Phil remained sacred in Dan’s schedule.

Chills ran across Dan’s skin at a particularly cool gust of wind, Phil too shivering. Dan eased the pressure on Phil’s head before standing up and trudging back to the car; he knew Phil to have some blankets in his trunk. (Phil was just that kind of person, Dan supposed.)

With three blankets and a water bottle in hand, Dan made his way back to where he’d brought Phil. He spread one blanket on the ground and sat on it, then he draped another over Phil and wrapped the third around himself. He felt kind of bad that Phil was lying on the pokey grass, so he attempted (and failed) to drag Phil onto the blanket.

Phil did eventually regained consciousness after what felt like ages to Dan but was probably about an hour after he’d gotten the blankets. Phil’d long stopped bleeding, and Dan had begun to play with his hair.

“What…” Phil mumbled, his head pounding making him unable to finish the statement.

“Phil!” Dan exclaimed, brushing the black fringe out of Phil’s face. “Finally you’re awake. Oh, my god, I was so scared.” He refrained from saying _lonely_ and _missing you_.

Phil went to furrow his eyebrows but a sharp, intense pain stopped him from doing so. He reached up a hand to touch where it hurt, shocked to feel a scab. Immediately, he began to sit up.

“ _Easy_ ,” Dan bit his lip and eyed Phil nervously, afraid he’d fall back over and pass out again.

The latter took in his surroundings putting two and two together when he saw the dented car in the middle of the field.

Not particularly wanting to deal with the situation, Phil lied back down and looked up at the sky. Soon, his view was obstructed by Dan leaning over him.

“How’re you feeling?” he handed Phil the water bottle he had taken earlier.

“About as good as I can, under the circumstances.”

“Right, yeah.” Dan sighed, looking down at his fingers. “No service out here. I figure we can wait until morning to walk somewhere or hitchhike or whatever.”

“Yeah. No use in going anywhere, now.” Phil sat up again, facing towards Dan. He took a sip out of the bottle before asking, “Why aren’t we by the car?”

“Uh,” Dan smiled sheepishly, “I was scared that it… would blow up.”

This caused Phil to weakly chuckle “better safe than sorry” to which Dan nodded.

Dan invited Phil to sit next to him on the blanket and then the duo sat quietly for a while, looking up at the sky with vastly different things on their minds. They both began to speak at the same time.

“Do you believe-”

“Did you hear what I-”

“You first,” Dan nodded in apology, but Phil shook his head.

“Nah, mine’s stupid. You first.”

Dan sucked his cheek into his teeth before asking, “Did you hear what I said earlier?”

Phil paused, “I don’t think so. What was it?”

“ _Nothing,_ ” Dan let out a sigh of relief, “not really. Now what were you saying?”

“I was just going to ask if you believe in _aliens_.” Phil smiled, casting his gaze back up to the sky.

“Who do you think I am? Of _course_ I believe in aliens,” Dan established. “I mean, I _am_ an alien myself.”

Phil scoffed, “Yeah, right. And so am I.”

“To aliens we are!” Dan defended himself, to which Phil fondly shook his head.

“I suppose so.” Phil rolled his eyes. “Anyway, thanks for, uh, taking care of me before.”

Dan laughed, “What was I supposed to do, leave you bleeding and ride the bloody horse into the sunset?”

Phil shrugged, “‘Could’ve.”

“Like I’d do that to you. I’d do anything to-” Dan cut himself off, gulping and glancing over at Phil to see him looking at Dan with curious eyes.

“Hmm?” Phil hummed, awaiting Dan to finish his statement.

“Eh, I’d do anything to… for anyone in that situation.” Dan forced a grin and then looked away, wincing.

“Oh, right. Me too.”

Dan cursed himself for being like that, he just wasn’t good with Phil; well, with interacting with Phil.

Phil and Dan had always had quite an ambiguous relationship, both to outsiders and to themselves. Everyone knew they had potential, but neither of them decided to consciously act on it (even if Dan wanted to).

A sharp awkwardness filled the air so Dan tried to break it with, “Do you want to talk about what you were saying before the accident?”

Phil pursed his lips, “Maybe another time.”

“Okay.” Dan frowned.

“It’s just, we’re already in a kind of depressing situation. I don’t want to make it worse.” Phil muttered, barely loud enough for Dan to hear.

“It’s alright. Whatever you’re comfortable with.” Dan wrapped his blanket around himself a bit tighter, though the cold was beginning to seep through.

Before Dan could even complain about being cold, Phil perked up and said, “I know what we can do!”

“Yeah?”

“I have something in my car,” Phil grinned and stood up, but as soon as he took a step he stumbled and nearly tripped.

“Hey! Hey, wait for me.” Dan hauled himself off the blanket and held onto Phil’s shoulders to help him not to fall.

“My head’s just…” Phil started.

“I know.” Dan patted Phil’s shoulder, encouraging him forward. “But, I’m pretty sure the car isn’t going to blow now,” he lowly chuckled, “I think we’re safe.”

Phil just shook his head and continued towards the wrecked car. He opened the driver’s side door and winced at the blood on the steering wheel. Trying to disregard it, he reached over and into the center console, emerging with a plastic bottle of bubbles. He held it up to Dan with a gigantic, childish smile, and Dan couldn’t help but return the grin.

Using the car as a support, Phil walked to the front of the vehicle, hoisting himself onto the front of the hood.

“You’re crazy,” Dan said in response, staring at Phil with wide eyes, not budging from his spot.

“It’s _not_ gonna blow up,” Phil stated, patting the metal next to him, inviting Dan to sit with him.

Dan vigorously shook his head, causing Phil to bribe him.

“I’ll share my blanket with you if you come sit with me.”

“I have my own blanket,” Dan retorted, though he was already walking towards Phil.

A victory smile plastered across his face, Phil opened up his blanket and Dan sat inside of it. Phil rested his left arm over Dan’s shoulders and held the bubbles in the other. He handed the bottle over to Dan as he couldn’t unscrew the top with one hand, though Dan struggled to open the cap when his hands were shaking because of the two’s close proximity. (He hoped Phil didn’t notice; he seemed captivated by the night sky anyway.)

Eventually the cap screwed off the top of the bottle, so Dan took the bubble wand out and held it up to Phil’s face. Beaming, Phil leaned forward a bit and exhaled, causing seven bubbles to be swept up by the wind and carried into the darkness.

Dan figured there must’ve been some underlying poetic message behind this whole situations, but there was no way he could think of anything but the resonance of Phil’s laugh against the stark after hours.

“Let’s see who can blow a bigger one,” Phil suggested, taking the wand from Dan’s hand. He slipped his hand out from the blanket over Dan’s shoulders so he could get serious about the competition. Dan jutted his bottom lip out at the removal, but Phil didn’t notice.

“Let’s see who’s better at blowing.” Dan said something he knew would get Phil’s attention in response, causing Phil to roll his eyes.  
  
“Cheeky.”

After a few tries and re-dos in which _sore-loser_ Dan popped Phil’s bubble because it was getting too big and he could never win, Phil still emerged victorious. He teased Dan by blowing a puff of air into his face, and Dan punched his shoulder (lightly; he was still incredibly worried about Phil’s well being).

“Do you think,” Phil started, blowing another gust of bubbles into the air, “that a bubble is a valid form of transportation?” His line of sight followed a single bubble, _up, up, up,_ until it popped.

“I don’t think so.” Dan watched Phil’s hands fumble with the the plastic container.

“But, what if we put an ant in one or something?” Phil swished the wand around in the bubble mixture.

“I’m pretty sure it would drown, or fall to its death when the bubble popped.” Dan picked at his fingernails, awaiting whatever reasoning Phil would have to back him up.

“Uh,” he blew another set of bubbles, his eyes trailing along with them, “what about those bubbles that never pop?”

Dan wanted to say ‘suffocation,’ but he refrained as Phil had a shit-eating grin on his face as if he’d won the discussion. So, he just shook his head with an endearing smile and let Phil have it.

They just sat for awhile after that, Phil blowing bubbles and both watching them float up into the night sky. Dan couldn’t think of much other than the fact his thigh was touching Phil’s and so it was the warmest part of his body, and also how much he wanted to hold Phil’s hand. Naturally, Dan’s hands were always ice-cold. He figured Phil’s would be warm and he simply craved the gentle feeling achieved while holding hands.

After some time, Phil set the bottle down next to him on the hood of the car and slipped his blanket of his and Dan’s shoulders to lay it down behind him. He then leaned back onto the blanket and softly tugged at Dan’s elbow for him to join.

Draping his blanket over both himself and Phil, Dan accepted Phil’s invitation to lie back. They could look at the stars more easily this way, without craning their (already sore) necks.

Dan’s eyes fluttered closed after a while, despite the poor sleeping conditions, though Phil’s stayed wide open, scanning the skies. Phil twiddled his thumbs, pursing his lips and wishing himself the courage to just tell Dan what was on his mind before he fell asleep.

Right on the verge of unconsciousness, Dan heard Phil whisper his name.

“Hmm, yeah? What’s up?” He shifted his weight so that he faced Phil.

“I, uh,” he paused, sucking his lip between his teeth, thinking of how to word it. “I heard what you said before.”

“What? What’d I say?” Dan’s sleep-hazed brain didn’t process the statement.

Phil didn’t speak up again as his heart felt like it was in his throat, leaving Dan to nod off as if he hadn’t said anything, though it wasn’t long before it sunk in.

“ _Wait_. You heard _what I said_ earlier or you heard what I said _earlier_?” Dan had sat up and was turned to look at Phil.

Phil sat up with Dan and responded, “I don’t know what you’re trying to get at with that.”

Dan’s brain was racing. As he felt he was off the hook earlier, the panic began to refill his system. “I don’t know either. What’d you hear?”

Phil decided to put it as straightforward as possible, “You said you love me.”

 _Shit._ Dan was muddled and not sure what to say or do, so he blurted the first coherent (though untrue) words to come to mind. “I didn’t _mean_ it.”

“Ah,” Phil frowned, not able to read Dan’s facial expressions in the dark. “Right.”

Dan’s chest started to heave and he felt as though he was going to hack out a lung, so he just turned his body to face away from Phil.

“It was a panic and I don’t know what I was thinking just forget about it I’m sorry okay?” Dan spoke rapidly, all in one breath while still diverting his gaze.

“I get it.” Phil spoke like stone, plain and simple.

“Seriously, just forget it.” Dan reiterated, though there was no need. He felt his throat clench up as Phil muttered an “okay.”

Internally, he screamed at himself to say ‘ _Don’t_ forget it, you twat!’ but he couldn’t. He couldn’t and he wished Phil would say something for reassurance but nothing came.

The quiet remained heavy and looming over the two boys. Neither knew what exactly to say to the other; neither knew how to resolve the current standstill. Dan wanted the willpower to just _tell_ Phil the truth, because really, what was the worst that could happen? He’d not be disgusted, as he already would’ve acted so if he were.

Obviously neither of the two would’ve been falling asleep in an instant, as the temperature was far too low to be comfortable, they were lying on a metal surface, and it was hard to even think of sleeping while reliving the past few moments.

Dan clenched his eyes shut, trying to calm the unruly butterflies in his stomach. If they would just stay still for a moment, he could attempt to say something, but while they fluttered around, nothing could come out. He took a deep breath, and another. He held one in for a bit, and exhaled slowly.

“Phil?” he spoke, and bit his lip awaiting a response.

“You didn’t _mean_ it, I know,” Phil deadpanned, laying back down on the car.

“I… did.” Dan swallowed thickly, not daring to turn and face Phil.

“You did… what?” Phil’s voice was subdued, awaiting confirmation.

“I meant it.” Dan brought his knuckle up to his teeth and bit down on it. After Phil replied with silence, Dan intoned a soft, “I’m sorry.”

“No, no! Don’t be,” Phil assured, sitting back up. “I’m just… thinking.”

“Good or bad?”

“Good,” Phil breathed, snaking his hand under the blanket to intertwine with Dan’s. “ _Great._ ”

Dan sighed in relief, accepting Phil’s embrace. He scooted closer as well, prompting a comment from Phil on how cold he was. He laughed and didn’t hesitate to duck his head into Phil’s warm chest.

“I didn’t ask,” Phil started, “did you get hurt at all? I’m sorry I didn’t ask earlier, I just-”

“I’m fine, yeah,” Dan nodded, his hair ruffling on Phil’s shirt. “My neck hurts but otherwise, yeah. ‘More worried about you.”

“Understandable,” Phil chuckled, Dan feeling the vibrations.

Eventually Dan pulled away, sitting knee-to-knee with Phil on the hood of the beaten up car, a smile painted across his cheeks; the latter reflected his expression.

“But really, you have to tell me -,” Dan made eye contact for once, “- what do you feel? You never said, and while I’ve basically spilt my guts out to you, I feel kind of naked at the moment.”

Phil cocked his head slightly before beginning, “I lied earlier about not hearing you because I wasn’t sure if I’d heard you right,” he paused, “and how embarrassing would it be for me to think you confessed your love to me in the middle of a car accident? And how embarrassing would it be for me to say ‘I love you, too’ when that’s not really what you said?”

“And how embarrassing is it for me that I _did_ confess my love for you in a car accident…” Dan mumbled, trying to hide his absolutely cheesy blushing. Luckily, it was dark enough that Phil couldn’t detect the blood rushing to his cheeks.

It was Phil’s idea to wait until they could properly _see_ each other to kiss, and so when the sun finally started to rise, the butterflies returned to Dan’s stomach. This time, though, Phil took initiative, cupping Dan’s cheek and leaning forward to meet Dan in the middle.

After that, Dan decided he liked early mornings better than late nights. Early mornings had potential, untampered new beginnings every day. They were warm, fresh, unique, and blithe, radiating untrained sights and neoteric ideas. Early mornings brought brilliant colors and Phil’s eyes shone ever more brightly when the sunlight hit them.  


End file.
